The Kolkata Kaleidoscope

Bus number three zero six, reads the back of the yellow bus,

I board into it holding tight my daddy’s hand.

The driver starts the engine and the bus jeers into the heavy traffic,

Contributing to the honking horns of the racing taxis in yellow.

I put on my scarf green and lift the window screen,

Kolkata, that is how it sounds, and I am back to this wonder city.

My eyes, a minute spectator to each tiny movement that happens by the road.

Under the stars shining bright, the city glows up in a cradle of lights,

As the mighty Howrah bridge adorns the Ganges with its regal majesty.

The rickshaw puller pulls up his three-wheeler life humming a tune.

By the side smoky circles line up to the sky.

There sit ‘addas’ of young lads sipping up hot tea and munching cake buns,

Oh! What pity for the poor girl standing by.

There I see a gang of rag pickers come by

Their thirsty hands scrounging for gold in the garbage.

The bus moves on and brings me to the ‘Bada-bazaar’.

People thronging in bunches and masses,

Shoppers swarming up the shops and street-shoppers flooding up the streets.

A confused girl choosing a muffler, which is better, red or blue,

My choosy eyes would rather go for the purple hue.

Meanwhile, I hear those ‘babumoshais’ at the back boasting loud about their kitchen gardens.

Their gossips keep changing, from the football to the fish.

Hearing of fish, a stinky smell creeped into my nose.

I smell fish, and they smell of fish, but who?

Carrying baskets loaded in fish, those men dressed in vests and a thrice folded lungi.

The crawling bus crawls forward and fresh Kolkata breeze delights me back.

Hardly could I feel the wind that the bus halted at the red signal.

My eyeballs dancing side to side, suddenly stop at the painful sight on the footpath.

The poor lady makes up her bed by laying out a blue tarpaulin sheet

She lies down with her small son, covering him with a sheet of polythene.

Soon they fall asleep, wrapped within the blanket of hunger and curse.

My eyes get teary but I somehow put a brake on them.

The driver releases the brake and the bus flows past the green signal with a creaking jerk.

My eyes gleam with the royal lighting that had decorated the streets,

And I couldn’t resist myself from getting into the Kali Pujo mood.

As the bus leapt forward, we come across the figures of the great lords.

Statues of Raja Ram Mohan and Rabindranath- idols of the past, show-pieces of the present.

The air smells more of politics and competition,

As every person in the crowd gives in to this crazy rat-race.

I also enjoy some pinches of the funny salt sprinkled by my back seat aunty,

Who howls at her spectacled hubby to put on the monkey-cap.

Daddy calls me and I turn away from the window,

Saving in my memory a backup of the entire Kolkata kaleidoscope.

Lifting up my tiny bag, I alight with a cheery smile.

“Wait, something’s left”, my dad exclaimed.

So we stopped at the ‘Mishtanna Bhandaar’

And I stuffed in a mouth-watering ‘Rashogolla’ into my thirty-two.

Keeping this sweet mood, I stride happily to my aunt’s home.

The memorable bus ride stays in my mind,

And I fall in love with Kolkata, one of a kind.